thoughts on Appropriation versus Sampling

I keep saying to myself: Sampling is the Appropriation of the 21st century.So what are the differences? Some distinctions stand to be made.

I'm beginning to realize that the plaintiff in my case regards Molotov aspure Appropriation; but I've been thinking about what I do as pureSampling off the Web -- and that these two things describe our respectivecultures. (The fact that I go on to paint my sampled bits with my eye/handis probably just perverse). She hasn't yet made any distinctions betweenthe two, but I'm bent on doing so.

Here are a few thoughts that have crossed my mind since the beginning ofour discussion:

Appropriation:- refers specifically to an artistic practice of the 20th centurywhereby other artworks (usually) are derived or copied wholesale withspecific conceptual artistic intentions;- Appropriation usually functions in terms of "parody" or "comment" uponthe original artwork;- Appropriation always draws attention to the fact or act of theappropriation, rather than to try to hide the fact; the act ofappropriating is foregrounded in the resulting artwork.- Therefore, Appropriated artworks are always clearly and closely weddedto the original, rather than divorced from it; the idea is NOT to makesomething entirely new.

Sampling:- originally meant the taking--stealing--of short segments ofpre-recorded music to be used and remixed in/as a new work;- the term "Sampling" is increasingly used to denote the use ofpre-existing anything: film, photographs, logos, ads, texts, etc.,- One difference, therefore, is that Sampling makes use of not justpre-existing artworks, as does most of Appropriation, but of any or allmaterial existing in the larger culture. Anything can be sampled. Theincreased use of Sampling is certainly a result of the ubiquity of the Weband digital copying, and the increasing cheapness and ease and ubiquityof the technology we use to access our "larger culture";- Sampling is always about taking found bits and pieces in order to makesomething entirely new. Remixes disregard and discard the context,the intended meaning/s and artistic import of the original work beingsampled. Sampling is about creating something new, and not aboutcommenting on an original.

That's all I've got for now. Clearly the Joywar pieces are bothAppropriations and Sampled Remixes, in varying degrees.

I do not wish to answer specifically to your post below but rather declare what I have noticed...

Yes - what is interesting to me personally with something like the act of sampling is that the process has a genealogy. It moves in time like chinese whispers.

A mutation takes place. And even when we look at what we say or may be perceive as a beginning in embodied form such as a riot, a protest. Someone, or people making a protest, an activist responding to a situation with action, is repeating human history, it has a kind of story of its own, a journey, even a narrative(s), like many other aspects in life.

What is interesting is that appropriation regarding what is now termed as 'Joywar', which was spawned from a different image originally - lives on, it has evolved.

It seems that we cannot help but be influenced by each other - the behaviour of copying and re-distributing is an essential strategy for survival and potential mutualist understanding, or enemy defining, not necessarily and always in the grand scheme of things but in an everyday sense, it can be subtle and close to instinct, even intuitive. Appropriation is like acknowledging then understanding and then in some cases possessing, it is also territorial, and in most cases it must change and become something else yet maintain an essence of its source, its gene. Or it will not and cannot be seen, for it looses its reference and linked-definition - so, the updating has re-contexutalised (yuk word), has given it a new lease of life.

The proof is here, various people have explored their own definitions, not only because they wished to support you but because - copying and re-invention, re-recording is the act of reclaiming something. Making it part of our their own, our own history, it was updated because it was time to live once more, you were its carrier to fresh pastures...

marc :-D

>I keep saying to myself: Sampling is the Appropriation of the 21st century.>So what are the differences? Some distinctions stand to be made.>>I'm beginning to realize that the plaintiff in my case regards Molotov as>pure Appropriation; but I've been thinking about what I do as pure>Sampling off the Web -- and that these two things describe our respective>cultures. (The fact that I go on to paint my sampled bits with my eye/hand>is probably just perverse). She hasn't yet made any distinctions between>the two, but I'm bent on doing so.>>Here are a few thoughts that have crossed my mind since the beginning of>our discussion:>>Appropriation:>- refers specifically to an artistic practice of the 20th century>whereby other artworks (usually) are derived or copied wholesale with>specific conceptual artistic intentions;>- Appropriation usually functions in terms of "parody" or "comment" upon>the original artwork;>- Appropriation always draws attention to the fact or act of the>appropriation, rather than to try to hide the fact; the act of>appropriating is foregrounded in the resulting artwork.>- Therefore, Appropriated artworks are always clearly and closely wedded>to the original, rather than divorced from it; the idea is NOT to make>something entirely new.>>Sampling:>- originally meant the taking--stealing--of short segments of>pre-recorded music to be used and remixed in/as a new work;>- the term "Sampling" is increasingly used to denote the use of>pre-existing anything: film, photographs, logos, ads, texts, etc.,>- One difference, therefore, is that Sampling makes use of not just>pre-existing artworks, as does most of Appropriation, but of any or all>material existing in the larger culture. Anything can be sampled. The>increased use of Sampling is certainly a result of the ubiquity of the Web>and digital copying, and the increasing cheapness and ease and ubiquity>of the technology we use to access our "larger culture";>- Sampling is always about taking found bits and pieces in order to make>something entirely new. Remixes disregard and discard the context,>the intended meaning/s and artistic import of the original work being>sampled. Sampling is about creating something new, and not about>commenting on an original.>>>That's all I've got for now. Clearly the Joywar pieces are both>Appropriations and Sampled Remixes, in varying degrees.>>Any thoughts/comments/disagreements ?>>-Joy>>+>-> post: list@rhizome.org>-> questions: info@rhizome.org>-> subscribe/unsubscribe: http://rhizome.org/preferences/subscribe.rhiz>-> give: http://rhizome.org/support>-> visit: on Fridays the Rhizome.org web site is open to non-members>+>Subscribers to Rhizome are subject to the terms set out in the>Membership Agreement available online at http://rhizome.org/info/29.php>>> >

I just stumbled across this short essay by Leon Golub;here's a quote and the link:

"I'm nuts on images. I cut them out of books and newspapers, mostly booksand magazines. And this is absolutely crucial to me, because this is oneof the ways I tap into the world. It's the way I visualize it. But I seethe world not just out of my own obsessive attitude. I see the worldbecause it comes to me through media. Through film, through newspapers,through TV...we're surfeited really. We're over exposed. We're shoved atall the time by media. And I've often said it's kind of a half joke, youknow how they say you're sixty or eighty percent water? Well, actuallywe're made up of twenty-five thousand photographs, eleven thousand films.All of this has moved through us and is affecting us in some way or theother. So we're media creatures. We're living in an extraordinary visualworld."

joy,yes, i agree...I really don't have a simple thought that doesn't involve appropriation or sampling on some level. your painting and the photograph involve both but are different resolutions. Refusing that doesn't have to be a generational thing, as in when you were born or what sort of music you have been exposed to. Being able to accept it may be a bent of mind that is reinforced from being creative with a computer though, i hope so, but unfortunately the person suing you hasn't been bitten by that yet.nicholas